Mead man on mission Canada wins battle of the undefeated

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This article was published 06/04/2011 (5623 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

REGINA — Mistakes were made by a much younger man. And a hard lesson was learned.

And so flash forward a dozen years and Team Canada third Jon Mead is determined this week in his second trip to the World Men’s Curling Championship not to make the same mistakes as he made in his first.

“At the worlds in ’99,” Mead recalled Tuesday, “we were 8-0 and didn’t break a sweat. And we kind of started reading our own stuff a bit and got complacent.

“And we didn’t finish off the way we started. And so that’s in the back of my mind.”

And maybe front of mind, too. Because with Canada improving to 7-0 on Tuesday with an 11-5 victory over France and a 7-3 win over Scotland, this trip to the worlds has started off pretty much the same way as the last one did for Mead and skip Jeff Stoughton.

The question is how will it end? In 1999, it ended badly with an extra end loss to Scotland’s Hammy McMillan in the final. The margin of victory that week couldn’t have been smaller. And it has made Mead wonder over the years about the opportunities he missed that might have tilted the margin in his favour.

“I enjoyed myself off the ice too much,” Mead recalled of that nine days in Saint John, “and didn’t take opportunities to practise. (I) watched the Masters when we should have been doing stuff or watching rocks. And you lose by an inch and it’s a wasted opportunity. I have no interest in doing that again.”

Mead has backed up the talk of learning from past mistakes with action here this week. Take late Monday night, for instance. After a long day that saw Canada beat both Korea and the U.S., Mead headed back out on the ice after the arena had emptied to throw some more rocks.

It is the kind of thing that Mead does all the time now — seeking even the smallest advantage — perhaps precisely because he didn’t do it before when it might have made the difference in winning a world title.

“This is a weird sport that way,” Mead said. “Guys after a round at the Masters will hit balls for three hours. And most guys never think about throwing a rock. It blows me away.

“We practise a ton. And I went out last night — I had a ton of what felt like good throws and I just wasn’t getting much for results. I just wanted to go out and get some good feedback on a couple of throws. It felt good and I felt good out there as a result.”

Mead threw a sizzling 93 per cent — his best game of the week — against Scotland’s Tommy Brewster as Canada dominated the Scots in what was a first-place showdown between two 6-0 teams.

Canada jumped out to a 3-0 lead after just two ends as the Scots wilted before a packed and partisan Canadian crowd.

Brewster savoured the experience anyway: “Getting out in front of almost a full house and playing Canada — it doesn’t get any better than this.”

It was a similar recipe earlier Tuesday against France as Canada scored early and often, jumping out to a 6-1 lead after just the third end.

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Canada plays the Czech Republic (2-5) and Sweden (5-2) today and Stoughton said he is feeling a momentum in his team. “We’re in a good spot,” said Stoughton, “we’re rolling along.”

Mead said there’s still room to improve — and that’s good. “I’d hate to think I peaked,” he explained, “because I’ve done that before.”

Hubris may have cost him one world championship. It won’t cost him another.

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

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